Bad Economic News from India Implies a Greater Need to Focus on Renewable Energy

The New York Times has this article underlining something that I have been telling my friends about for a long time - the Indian economy is not really anywhere near as strong as the Delhi Doofuses have been trying to make it out to be. And when recession hit the USA and much of the rest of the world, India was going to hurt: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/business/global/05rupee.html

This is a Renewable Energy blog and what this blog seeks to encourage is a possible solution to at least a part, if not the complete crisis facing India at the moment. The bulk of India's foreign exchange outflow is to buy fuel - fossil fuel. Yes, exactly that filthy stuff that burns your nostrils when you walk down any Indian street and leaves the inner side of your shirt collar a thick, oily black when you return home. Indians in particular have grown so lazy about resources that they have available right in front of them that they do not want to do anything about them.

Let me point one thing out - while investment funds are not available for stuff like call centers and software subcontracts at the moment, they are certainly (and increasingly) available for Green Energy efforts. The US Exim Bank actually raised the amount of money available for Renewable Energy equipment exports to India from $ 2 billion in 2008 to $ 5.5 billion for 2009. Sadly, I doubt that more than a small fraction of these funds will ever be used. India is, after all, a country where Rs 78,000 crores worth of foreign aid is lying unused: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/india-sitting-on-unutilised-foreign-aid-of-rs-78-000-crore-cag/426883/ The tragedy does not end there. The all knowing Government of India, aka the Delhi Doofuses, are paying commitment money to International lenders because they asked for this money and are now not using it.

Recently, while elections were underway, there has been more than a little noise about focusing on solar power. During the crisis while the world slowly gets out of the present recession, India needs to look at the unutilized money, look at encouraging solar power, at using the sewerage that it sends out into the rivers and the seas constructively by extracting methane from it for use as a fuel and also by processing fertilizer from it, and more. The most efficient economies eventually become the richest ones. India cannot afford to continue to throw resources away as it is doing at the moment. If it continues to do this, it will sink. If it doesn't, it could well become one of the richest countries in the world.